lynda carter

There are many perks to being an entertainment journalist. Aside from getting paid to watch and write about TV, you sometimes get to meet your childhood heroes. The other day I did just that when I met Lynda Carter. Yes, I met Wonder Woman.

When I was in elementary school, around 7 years old, FX started airing reruns of Adam West's 'Batman' TV series. Already a fan of the character thanks to my father and his comic book collecting, I was hooked. One day, I remember questioning what was on before 'Batman.' It was 'Wonder Woman.'

Suffice to say, I became instantly drawn to this powerful woman, wearing satin tights fighting for my rights. She was new and colorful to me. I was enamored.

Wonder Woman can sing? Who knew? Former Amazon princess Lynda Carter released her third album, 'Crazy Little Things,' in April. Friday, she appeared on 'Today' (weekdays, 7AM on NBC) to talk about her music and sing a song from the new album.

Hoda Kotb introduced Carter with her credits, saying she is "a beauty queen, model, spokesperson, voiceover artist and successful singer." She's best well-known from the '70s television version of 'Wonder Woman.' Carter said some of her band had been with her since those early days. "Some of the people that are with me today started out with me, did the music on 'Wonder Woman' and did some of the specials I did," she said.

When Lynda Carter auditioned for 'Wonder Woman' in 1975, she was vying against a bevy of talented actors to get what she saw as the only good role for a woman on television at the time. Carter said today on 'The Wendy Williams Show' (weekdays, syndicated) that you had to be a mother, a hooker or a secretary to get on television at that time.

Carter would see many familiar faces at auditions, including Farrah Fawcett, Cheryl Ladd, Jaclyn Smith and Lindsay Wagner, including her 'Wonder Woman' audition. "We all ended up, for every part that came along, it was the same group of women," said Carter. "I walk in the room and I see them all sitting there, we go 'Hi.'"

NBC's new David Kelley–helmed 'Wonder Woman' series hasn't even hit the airwaves yet, but already the new costume has been criticized everywhere from Time magazine to Fox News. On 'The Talk' (weekdays, syndicated on CBS), '70s Wonder Woman Lynda Carter gave her thoughts: She prefers her old costume to the new one.

"They're trying to update with the way we're all doing leggings now and skinny jeans," she said. Carter's costume had the requisite superhero underwear, whereas the new costume is vinyl with long, form-fitting pants. Carter did say that Kelley is brilliant and full of surprises, so there's hope for the series. Sharon Osbourne promptly asked who he was.

Lynda Carter, the face of Wonder Woman, thanks to the three seasons she spent playing the Amazon princess in the 1970s, said she is behind NBC's new 'Wonder Woman' pilot and its writer, David E. Kelley.

While promoting her concert in Baltimore, the 59-year-old star told the Baltimore Sun that it's about time Wonder Woman returned to TV.

"I think it is an amazing role to play," Carter told the newspaper about Adrianne Palicki's casting. "I know she is going to be really nervous about it, just because you would be. But I have a lot of confidence in David Kelley and what he's going to come up with. David Kelley's so talented, and that's really where it needs to be, is in the writing."

Carter said she believes Bullock is perfect for the role because she has "exactly the kind of personality" and that she's also "strong and feminine. And Wonder Woman has to be accessible". She also dismissed rumors that claimed she said Bullock was too old for the role.

Me? If she gets the role, I just want to see her kick the ever-living snot out of some Jesse James bad-guy look-a-like. Jesse James is such a dead man now.

The actress and singer didn't have a cell phone on her, so she signaled a nearby fishermen to call the police. When the authorities arrived, she directed them to the body.

Now, if she were actually Wonder Woman, she would have found a remote area (either inside her boat or on the shore) and done the spinny thing that changed her into Wonder Woman. She then would have investigated the murder and found the Nazi saboteurs behind the death who would have captured her and tied her up (or perhaps Steve Trevor or possibly both). While they gave a soliloquy of their dastardly plans, she would have cunningly escaped her bonds. A cool fight scene would have ensued and the criminals would be brought to justice as a denouement.

Sadly, she isn't Wonder Woman. She is, however, a humanitarian. Carter says she "did what anybody would have done."

I was reading Brad's post about bad superhero shows, and the site he linked to picked the Cathy Lee Crosby version of Wonder Woman, which I think is silly. It was much better than the Lynda Carter version and was smart enough to use an instrumental theme song, not one with lyrics. When you try to put lyrics to a superhero show theme song, the results are usually very bad.

Here are my choices for five horrible lyrics from TV theme songs. I'm not saying these are the worst. Maybe this could be a regular feature. There are so many to choose from, but these really stand out. (I did a similar post a couple of years ago, but it was strictly bizarre lyrics, not necessarily "bad" ones. The list needs to be updated, especially since I didn't include the number one choice.)

(S06E18) Wonder Woman on Smallville? Only in our wildest dreams. Still Lynda Carter is about as close to the real thing as we'll probably get. If you ask me, she still looks like a Wonder Woman. Hubba hubba. I kept hoping she'd spin around and then have her tights on and take Lex to town. No such luck.

So, speaking of Lynda Carter ... yes, she's Chloe's mom. Yes, she has meteor powers. Yes, she was in Smallville during the original meteor shower. So why hasn't Chloe found out any of this stuff before? Has she been turning a blind eye where mommy dearest is concerned? Inquiring minds wanna know.

You don't see as many made-for-TV movies today as you used to. Sure, Lifetime does some and you'll find some on cable and the odd one on CBS, but the networks don't really do them anymore (and if they do they stretch them to two or more nights and call them a mini-series). But you could see them all the time in the 60s, 70s, and 80s. Here are five they hardly show anymore, if ever, but I remember them fondly.

1. One Of My Wives Is Missing (1976): Mystery about a man who reports his wife missing, then a woman shows up claiming to be his wife and he says she isn't. Stars Jack Klugman, Elizabeth Ashley, and James Franciscus. I pride myself in being able to figure out the shocking endings and plot twists that so many movies have (that's what happens when you watch so much TV, not much surprises you anymore), but this movie completely blew me away. It doesn't just have a twist ending, it has about three, and you just smile at the end because it's so clever, and you try to think back to everything that happened to see if they played fair. I haven't seen this movie in about 15 years. It's not on DVD and I can't remember the last time someone ran it. (It was remade years later with a different title, but it wasn't as good.)

Looking at a picture of me, it's nearly impossible to tell that in my early days I was a geek (ahem). But it's true, I was the kid sitting behind you in chemistry class who, when the teacher was too hungover to make it to the end of the period and so gave the class some time to talk amongst themselves, took out a science fiction book and read quietly. You maybe wanted to beat me up, but if you had any kind of heart you would have realized that I was already bullied by fate (fate in this case being a shy disposition and a love of Star Trek novels).

Geeks require a very specific kind of TV woman to crush on. She needs to be hot, yes (I mean, after all, we are guys), but she can't be so hot as to be unattainable. Pamela Anderson could be admired, but like the captain of the cheerleaders, she was way out of our league. We needed girls that radiated geek waves back at us. There needed to be something in her demeanor that screamed, "Yes, I know you're different and terribly uncoordinated and made a fool out of yourself on President's Council on Physical Fitness day in gym class, but, dammit, I'm willing to take a chance on you." Also, it helped if she wore a super-hero costume.